Which to use
“miss” and “missed” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #609
- “miss” frequency rank
- #1,567
- “missed” frequency rank
- 2176
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | miss | missed |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To fail to hit, catch, grasp, etc. | simple past and past participle of miss |
Where the eye mixes miss and missed
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. miss (/mɪs/) and missed (/mɪst/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “miss” sits inside “missed”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2176, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
miss is recorded at frequency rank #609, classified as averb, pronounced /mɪs/. missed is at rank #1,567, tagged as averb, pronounced /mɪst/.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 2176, this pair ranks #525,672 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of miss vs missed
Shared letters: ims. Private to "miss": -. Private to "missed": de.
"miss" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "missed" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC